|
Pakeezah (1972, India)
In writer/director Kamal Amrohi's romantic melodrama
(with music) - one of the best Bollywood films of all time, and India's
first Cinemascopic color film - with incredible, complex and elaborate
set-production design:
- the film's main setting, a red-light district brothel
(or katha) in North India (Lucknow) at the turn of the century,
where nautch-girls or tawaifs (prostitute-girls who sang and danced
for rich noblemen in exchange for money) could be seen far into
the distance and background on various multi-storied levels of
the brothel
|
|
Red-Light District Multi-Level Brothel
|
- the back story: a Muslim courtesan named Nargis
(the director's wife Meena Kumari) had attempted to elope with
her lover Shahabuddin (Ashok Kumar); when rejected by Hakim Saab
(D.K. Sapru) - the patriarch of Shahabuddin's family, Nargis fled
to a graveyard to live there; on her deathbed after delivering
a baby, she wrote him a letter (never delivered) asking him to
come for his newborn daughter
- the main protagonist in the current day - young, pure
at heart Sahibjaan (or Sahib Jaan) (also Kumari), Nargis's grown-up
daughter, brought up by brothel madame Nawabjaan (Veena), her mother's
sister; the young girl entranced male visitors to the brothel with
her beautiful dancing and singing, but was not allowed to fall in
love
- the scenes of Sahibjaan's forbidden romance with aristocratic,
wealthy prince Salim Ahmed Khan (Raaj Kumar), Shahabuddin's nephew,
who renamed her "Pakeezah" (meaning 'pure one or girl')
in order to legally marry her - although his offer of marriage was
refused because of parental pressure (the same fate as her mother!)
- the film's conclusion - ironically Sahibjaan was invited
to dance a mujra at Salim's wedding to another woman, where
she performed on broken glass (symbolically seeking a destruction
of their love); during the ceremony, she met with her lost father,
Shahabuddin, who gave his dying permission for Salim to marry Sahibjaan
("Pakeezah")
- the final view was of a 'real' Pakeezah, another young
brothel girl watching from another balcony, who was trapped, as she
watched 'Pakeezah' taken away by Salim; in contrast, she would never
have a man who loved her come into her life and take her away from
the brothel
|
Daughter Sahibjaan Performing on Broken Glass at Wedding
Sahibjaan ("Pakeezah")
Young Brothel Girl Watching
|